ML222885481

Age

Not specified

Sex

Not specified

Media notes

Analog camera hand-held to the objective lens of a Questar telescope

Observation details

Transcribed from micro cassette with contemporaneous filed notes: "And I'm looking at what is probably a Dark-bellied Tree Duck. Standing in water that comes up just up to its belly. It has pink legs. Almost a tawny-colored bill, except for the distal 1/8th which appears to be a little bit pale blue and then the very tip is dark. It has a distinct narrow white eye-line encircling the eye[sic-I should have set ring of orbital feathers]. The crown, the auricular, the malar area, the chin and the throat are all very light almost white color. Starting at the occiput and going down the mid-line of the nape and the hind-neck is a dark brown streak. There is a sharp demarcation between the lighter head and neck and the darker lower neck and body. The upper parts of the body are almost uniformly brown with just a few white or lighter markings. The lower foreneck, the breast and the sides are the same color brown, fairly warm brown. The blanks, and the abdomen appear to be almost dark black. The secondaries...just flew....saw very dramatic white wing patches on the upper outer wings...now I have the bird again...and there really two of them...the rump is black...the upper tail is black...the underpart of the tail is white with dark markings...but the vent becomes black again as it goes into the abdomen...I can see white on the folded wings perhaps on the secondaries...I'm about 75 yards away from these birds...I have been viewing them with the Questar...both 40 and 64 power.. I have just shot off 8 pictures through the Celestron 750 mm f6 with a doubler with 200 ASA VIG Koda print film using an exposure of 1/500 of a second. I had it on my tripod but I was pressing the shutter with my finger and holding the camera body as steadily as I could with my hands...now taking pictures 9, 10, 11 and 12 with the Questar lens which is about f14 at 1/250th with 200 color print VIG Kodak film holding the camera lens again or the body as best I can...it's now 11:26 and there are lots of other birds here but I am going to go into Cosmos and get something to eat. Then come back and finish up." In the Winter 1987 issue of the Loon, Robert Janssen reported a pair of Black-bellied Whistling-Ducks seen at Thompson Lake from 8/7/1987 to 10/3/1987, when duck hunting season opened. ;The Minnesota Ornithologist's Union Records Committee classified these birds as Ac on the Minneosta Checklist because of question about origin or wildness of the birds. As of this writing (3/30/2020) this sighting is not displayed on the eBird species map.

Technical information

Dimensions

3000 pixels x 2000 pixels

Original file size

1.16 MB